Work on four blocks of apartments in Kilcock, Co Kildare has stalled after the Health and Safety Authority this week secured an order for the site’s immediate closure.
The authority said the High Court order was necessary to “reduce the risk of injury, or worse” at The Mall, Bridge Street. This was despite work on the site already being voluntarily stopped by the operators.
The closure order for the site, which includes a protected structure, The Lion’s House pub, was secured on consent of the operator company.
The order against Cuan Alainn Property Developments Ltd followed complaints from the public, multiple inspections, and a site inspector coming to the view he could no longer rely on assurances from the company’s principal, Aristidis Georgakis, court documents show.
READ MORE
“This is not a step we take lightly,” the authority’s interim chief executive, Mark Cullen, said after the order was made on Wednesday under the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005. “But where there is a clear, ongoing danger to workers’ lives, we are legally and morally compelled to act.”
Planning files show permission was granted in 2020 for 39 studios and apartments in a long-term “build to rent” residential development on the site, with a shared accommodation development in the former pub.
In an affidavit to the court, health and safety inspector Kevin Broderick said he first visited the site in August 2023 following a complaint from a member of the public.
Among the matters noted was that many of the workers were not wearing safety helmets or high visibility vests, that shuttering supports for wet concrete were overhanging the public footpath on one block, and “no protection was provided to members of the public passing by [one of the blocks] under construction which overhung the public footpath”.
Mr Broderick arrived at the site at 10.30am and was told Mr Georgakis had the safety file and was on his way. When he arrived at 2.30pm, Mr Georgakis did not have personal protection equipment with him, the inspector told the court.
“He proffered several excuses for the deficiencies on site, and appeared to blame Kildare County Council for same,” said Mr Broderick.
A colleague, Eoghan Moylan, visited the site in June 2024, following the receipt of another complaint from the public.
As a result, Mr Moylan issued several prohibition notices. However, when the two inspectors visited the site the following month, they found work being carried out contrary to the notices. They decided that not only had the safety situation not improved, “there had been a severe deterioration,” Mr Broderick said.
Over the following period there were various contacts with the company and parties working for it, and multiple visits to the site, Mr Broderick told the court.
“In light of the persistent and repeated failure to comply with the applicable law, the authority is not satisfied that the assurances provided by Mr Georgakis, which are in any event inadequate, are sufficient,” the inspector said.
The latest annual report for Cuan Alainn Property Developments, of Longford Road, Mullingar, shows its directors and shareholders are Aristidis (76), Alexander (45) and Philip Georgakis (42), all Canadian citizens, with the same address in the United Arab Emirates.
The company, which was incorporated in 2021, recorded a pretax profit of €5,150 in the year to the end of March 2024. There was no response to a request to the company for comment.
